Title: Caught in the Middle
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Josef Kostan/Mick St. John
Fandom: Moonlight
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1,675
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the lovely Josef Kostan or Mick St. John, unfortunately. Please do not sue.

***

Why was he having this conversation with himself? Josef thought, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning back against the soft cushions of his living room couch. It was ridiculous. There was no need for him to worry. Everything would be fine.

Or would it? He sighed softly, closing his eyes and letting a picture of Mick St. John form in his mind. What was it about Mick that made him feel as though he wanted to change everything about himself, to be a better person than he'd been in all the centuries since he'd been turned?

He was over four hundred years old, dammit. He shouldn't feel that he'd spent all of those years being a person that he couldn't be proud of. He shouldn't hate to look in the mirror because there were times when he didn't like what lurked behind his pretty face.

There was nothing wrong with the way he'd lived his long life. Okay, so he'd gone a little crazy at first, and he had abused the power he had. But there had been nothing wrong with taking revenge on the men who'd raped him and left him to die in a ditch.

Mick had said more than once that he didn't find fault with Josef's actions -- so why should he himself be ashamed of some of the things he'd done? There had been things that he couldn't bring himself to tell Mick about, because he didn't his boyfriend to be repelled by his actions.

It was stupid to feel this way. He wasn't like he used to be. He'd changed over the years. Sarah had been able to change him in some ways; she'd softened him, made him more aware of the world around him and how humans lived their short lives.

And Mick had changed him even more. It was because of Mick that he'd started to feel more merciful toward a lot of the humans who crossed his path. He hadn't gone out of his way to kill humans for a very long time; but now, he felt more of a kinship for them.

It had been so long since he himself was human that he'd forgotten what it was like, really. He took his long life span for granted, which was something that he probably shouldn't do. But even his attitude towards his own vampiric existence had changed with the advent of Mick in his life.

Mick hadn't asked him to change. Mick probably didn't even want him to change. But Josef couldn't help feeling that his boyfriend would always be bothered by how he'd lived his life before they had met -- and even for a few decades after they'd come to know each other.

What made him think that he should change, other than that sneaking suspicion that Mick would prefer it if he did? Nothing, really. Mick had never told him that he should live his life any differently, but he'd always tacitly disapproved of some of the things Josef had done.

His boyfriend didn't even like the fact that Josef preferred to take his blood straight from the vein, rather than rely on blood banks. He could do it if he had to, but there was nothing to compare with the feeling -- or the taste -- of hot blood coming directly from a human.

Mick couldn't really understand that. He'd always tried to refrain from taking blood in that way, wanting to hold on to as much of his humanity as he could. Josef had always disdained his humanity; he wanted to get far away from that life.

He had never been happy as a human. That was the big difference between Mick and himself; his boyfriend had led a fairly happy human existence. Becoming a vampire hadn't been something he would have ever wanted, had he actually been given a choice.

If Mick had been turned in the same way that he had, when his life hung in the balance, would he have been more willing to turn towards the life he led now? Josef had often wondered about that, though he'd never asked Mick what he would have done.

He was fairly certain that at one point, his boyfriend would declare he'd rather have died than become the monster he was now. But would he, now that the two of them had each other? That person was the old Mick, before he and Josef had become lovers.

So much had changed for both of them since they'd confessed their feelings and decided to embark on a life together. Not only for him, but for Mick as well. Josef was well aware that his boyfriend had made some sacrifices to be with him.

Mick was giving up his independence; he was moving in here in just a few weeks, as soon as the lease on his other apartment ran out. In a way, that was a step towards giving up an identity and a privacy that he'd spent decades forging for himself.

Yet he was willing to do that, Josef told himself. Couldn't he himself give up some things for Mick? After all, he didn't have to completely tear himself away from what he was used to. But somehow, it felt like a betrayal of the man he loved to take blood from a human now.

Drinking someone's blood was such an intimate act; the people who he took blood from these days didn't look at him as a lover, only as a friend, but yet it somehow felt wrong to be on that kind of intimate footing with them. It felt almost like he was cheating on Mick.

It grew harder and harder for him to take blood in the way he'd been used to doing it. And that made him restless and irritable; it showed in his business dealings, and some of his associates had mentioned it. He had to find a way to banish that restlessness for good.

Would it really be that hard to give up something he had become used to over the years? Or was he willing to make that sacrifice because he felt that Mick would want him to? Josef sighed again, not sure of what to think, or even how he should feel.

What worried him the most was the nagging feeling that if he didn't change some things about himself that he knew Mick didn't agree with, the other man would eventually find someone who could live up to what he wanted -- and Josef would be alone again.

Instead of fretting about the situation, he should just talk to Mick, Josef told himself. He'd promised himself that he wouldn't keep any secrets from the man he loved; and even though this wasn't a secret, it was a worry that he knew would only get more prevalent if he didn't address it.

But that wouldn't be as easy to do as it sounded. How was he going to tell the man he loved with all his heart that he was afraid Mick wouldn't love him unless he changed himself in some major ways? That was an insult to Mick, to the other man's love for him.

Mick loved him as he was, faults and all. Josef knew that. He'd always known that, from the beginning of their relationship. Mick didn't expect him to change. The crux of the matter was that he expected those changes of himself, without really wanting to make them.

He was willing to give up so much for his boyfriend -- but he couldn't do it all at once. And if he hesitated, he was afraid that those changes would never happen, and that not only would he lose Mick, he would lose his own respect for himself.

Talking to Mick about all of this was the only choice he had, Josef told himself, trying to make that inner voice sound firmer than it felt. If he didn't, then he would never know how his lover felt, and he'd always have this indecision eating away at him.

When Mick came here tonight, he'd broach the subject somehow. He'd get his feelings out in the open -- and more importantly, he'd find out just how Mick felt. Maybe then he'd know if he needed to try to change some things about himself to make his lover happy.

If he was going to change, he should want to to it for himself, not for his boyfriend, that annoying little voice in the back of his mind piped up again. He should want to change, not feel that he was obligated to do it. If he didn't, then he was contemplating change for the wrong reasons.

Part of him wanted to change. Part of him wanted to cling to how he'd always been, ever since the night he'd been turned and had discovered that there was a life beyond the meager human one he'd led up until then. And he felt caught somewhere in the middle.

For the first time in his vampiric existence, he was unsure of what he wanted from the life he was leading. The only thing he knew for sure was that he wanted to be with Mick St. John. For eternity. And that he would do anything, make any change he had to, for that to happen.

If Mick wanted him to change, then he would do it, Josef told himself firmly. And he would happy to make those changes, if they gave him eternity with the man he loved. It simply remained to be seen just what those changes might be -- or how well he would cope with them when they came.

***